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Building the Network
of the Future
Getting Smarter, Faster, and More Flexible
with a Software Centric Approach
Building the Network
of the Future
Getting Smarter, Faster, and More Flexible
with a Software Centric Approach

by
John Donovan and Krish Prabhu
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Donovan, John, 1960- author. | Prabhu, Krish, 1954- author.


Title: Building the network of the future : getting smarter, faster, and more
flexible with a software centric approach / by John Donovan, Krish
Prabhu.
Description: Boca Raton : Taylor & Francis, CRC Press, 2017. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017009175 | ISBN 9781138631526 (hardback : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Computer networks--Technological innovations. | Cloud
computing. | Virtual computer systems.
Classification: LCC TK5105.5 .B8454 2017 | DDC 004.6--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017009175

Visit the Taylor & Francis Web site at


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and the CRC Press Web site at
http://www.crcpress.com
Contents
Foreword...........................................................................................................................................vii
Acknowledgments..............................................................................................................................ix
Authors...............................................................................................................................................xi

Chapter 1 The Need for Change....................................................................................................1


John Donovan and Krish Prabhu

Chapter 2 Transforming a Modern Telecom Network—From All-IP to Network Cloud............. 9


Rich Bennett and Steven Nurenberg

Chapter 3 Network Functions Virtualization...............................................................................25


John Medamana and Tom Siracusa

Chapter 4 Network Functions Virtualization Infrastructure....................................................... 49


Greg Stiegler and John DeCastra

Chapter 5 Architecting the Network Cloud for High Availability............................................... 67


Kathleen Meier-Hellstern, Kenichi Futamura, Carolyn Johnson, and Paul Reeser

Chapter 6 Software-Defined Networking.................................................................................... 87


Brian Freeman and Han Nguyen

Chapter 7 The Network Operating System: VNF Automation Platform................................... 103


Chris Rice and Andre Fuetsch

Chapter 8 Network Data and Optimization............................................................................... 137


Mazin Gilbert and Mark Austin

Chapter 9 Network Security....................................................................................................... 171


Rita Marty and Brian Rexroad

Chapter 10 Enterprise Networks.................................................................................................. 201


Michael Satterlee and John Gibbons

Chapter 11 Network Access......................................................................................................... 223


Hank Kafka

v
vi Contents

Chapter 12 Network Edge............................................................................................................ 249


Ken Duell and Chris Chase

Chapter 13 Network Core............................................................................................................ 265


John Paggi

Chapter 14 Service Platforms...................................................................................................... 293


Paul Greendyk, Anisa Parikh, and Satyendra Tripathi

Chapter 15 Network Operations.................................................................................................. 331


Irene Shannon and Jennifer Yates

Chapter 16 Network Measurements............................................................................................. 353


Raj Savoor and Kathleen Meier-Hellstern

Chapter 17 The Shift to Software................................................................................................ 389


Toby Ford

Chapter 18 What’s Next?............................................................................................................. 401


Jenifer Robertson and Chris Parsons

Index...............................................................................................................................................407
Foreword
It’s easy to forget just how thoroughly mobile connectivity has changed our relationship with
technology. Any new piece of hardware is judged not just for the processor, memory, or camera
it contains but for how well it connects. Wi-Fi, fiber, 4G—and soon 5G—have become the new
benchmarks by which we measure technological progress.
In many ways, this era of high-speed connectivity is a lot like the dawn of the railroads or the
superhighways in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, respectively. Like those massive infra-
structure projects, connectivity is redefining society. And it is bringing capabilities and knowledge
to all facets of society, enabling a new era of collaboration, innovation, and entertainment.
Yet most people take networks for granted because so much of what happens on them is hidden
from view. When we use our phones or tablets or stream video to our connected cars, we expect
the experience to be simple and seamless. The last thing we should care about is how they are con-
necting or onto what networks. And all the while we continue to place ever-heavier loads on these
networks, which now include 4K video and virtual reality.
Keeping up with these demand curves is a monumental task. In fact, knowing how to manage,
secure, transport, and analyze these oceans of data might be the single greatest logistical challenge
of the twenty-first century.
Needless to say, this is a relatively new phenomenon. It used to be that the biggest test for any
telephone network was the ability to handle the explosion of calls on Mother’s Day. Now, any day
can be the busiest for a network—when an entire season of a popular show is released or when the
latest smartphone OS upgrade goes live. A network today must always be prepared.
This paradigm shift requires a new kind of network, one that that can respond and adapt in
near-real time to constant and unpredictable changes in demand while also being able to detect and
deflect all manner of cyber threats.
The old network model completely breaks down in the face of this. That’s why software-defined
networking (SDN) and network function virtualization (NFV) are moving from concept to imple-
mentation so rapidly. This is the network of the future: open-sourced, future-proofed, highly secure,
and flexible enough to scale up to meet any demand.
This book lays out much of what we have learned at AT&T about SDN and NFV. Some of the
smartest network experts in the industry have drawn a map to help you navigate this journey. Their
goal is not to predict the future but to help you design and build a network that will be ready for
whatever that future holds. Because if there’s one thing the last decade has taught us, it’s that net-
work demand will always exceed expectations. This book will help you get ready.

Randall Stephenson
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, AT&T

vii
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to acknowledge the support from and the following contributions by Mark
Austin, Rich Bennett, Chris Chase, John DeCastra, Ken Duell, Toby Ford, Brian Freeman, Andre
Fuetsch, Kenichi Futamura, John Gibbons, Mazin Gilbert, Paul Greendyk, Carolyn Johnson, Hank
Kafka, Rita Marty, John Medamana, Kathleen Meier-Hellstern, Han Nguyen, Steven Nurenberg,
John Paggi, Anisa Parikh, Chris Parsons, Paul Reeser, Brian Rexroad, Chris Rice, Jenifer Robertson,
Michael Satterlee, Raj Savoor, Irene Shannon, Tom Siracusa, Greg Stiegler, Satyendra Tripathi, and
Jennifer Yates.
The authors would also like to acknowledge the contributions of Tom Restaino and Gretchen
Venditto in the editing of the book.
All royalties will be donated to the AT&T Foundation and will be used to support STEM
education.

ix
Authors
John Donovan is chief strategy officer and group president AT&T Technology and Operations
(ATO). Donovan was executive vice president of product, sales, marketing, and operations at
VeriSign Inc., a technology company that provides Internet infrastructure services. Prior to that,
he was chairman and CEO of inCode Telecom Group Inc. Mr. Donovan was also a partner with
Deloitte Consulting, where he was the Americas Industry Practice director for telecom.

Krish Prabhu retired as president of AT&T Labs and chief technology officer for AT&T, where he
was responsible for the company’s global technology direction, network architecture and evolution,
and service and product design. Krish has an extensive background in technology innovation from
his time at AT&T Bell Laboratories, Alcatel, Morgenthaler Ventures, and Tellabs. He also served as
COO of Alcatel, and CEO of Tellabs.

xi
1 The Need for Change
John Donovan and Krish Prabhu

CONTENTS
References........................................................................................................................................... 8

Although the early history of electrical telecommunication systems dates back to the 1830s, the
dawn of modern telecommunications is generally viewed as Alexander Graham Bell’s invention of
the telephone in 1876. For the first 100 years, the telecom network was primarily “fixed”—the users
were restricted to being stationary (other than some limited mobility offered by cordless phones)
in locations that were connected to the telecom infrastructure through fixed lines. The advent of
mobile telephony in the 1980s, made it possible to move around during a call, eventually ushering in
the concept of “personal communication services,” allowing each user to conduct his or her own call
on his or her own personal handset, when and where he or she wants to. To facilitate this, the fixed
network was augmented with special mobility equipment (towers with radio antennas, databases
that tracked the movement of users, etc.) that interoperated with the existing infrastructure.
The invention of the browser launched the Internet in the mid-1990s. Like mobile networks, the
Internet also builds on top of the fixed telecom network infrastructure, by augmenting it with spe-
cial equipment (modems, routers, servers, etc.). However, the development of the Internet has not
only made it possible to bring communication services to billions of people, but has also dramati-
cally transformed the business and the social world. Today, the widespread use of the Internet by
people all over the world and from all walks of life has made it possible for Internet Protocol (IP) to
be not only the data network protocol of choice, but also the technology over which almost all forms
of future networks are built, including the traditional public telephone network.
At a high level, a telecom network can be thought of as comprising two main components: a core
network with geographically distributed shared facilities interconnected through information trans-
port systems, and an access network comprising dedicated links (copper, fiber, or radio) connecting
individual users (or their premises) to the core network. The utility provided by the infrastructure is
largely dependent on availability of transport capacity. The Communications Act of 1934 called for
“rapid, efficient, Nation-wide, and world-wide wire and radio communication service with adequate
facilities at reasonable charges” to “all the people of the United States.” This principle of universal
service helped make telephone service ubiquitous. Large capital investments were made to deploy
transport facilities to connect customers who needed telephone service, across wide geographic areas.
The deployed transport capacity was much above what was needed for a basic voice service, and as
new technology solutions developed (digital subscriber, optical fiber, etc.), it became clear that the
network was capable of doing much more than providing voice services. The infrastructure that sup-
ported ubiquitous voice service, evolved to support data services and provide broadband access to the
Internet. Today, according to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), high-speed (broad-
band) Internet is an essential communication technology, and ought to be as ubiquitous as voice. The
quality of political, economic, and social life is so dependent on the telecom network that it is rightly
deemed as a nation’s critical infrastructure.
The history of mobile telephony and Internet has been one of continuous evolution and ever
increasing adoption. The pace of innovation has been exponential—matching the explosion of ser-
vice offerings with those of new applications. Starting with the 1G mobility system that were first

1
2 Building the Network of the Future

introduced in the 1970s and reached a peak subscriber base of 20 million voice customers, today’s
4G systems serve a global base of nearly 2 billion smartphone customers.1
“The transformative power of smartphones comes from their size and connectivity.”2 Size makes
it easy to carry them around; connectivity means smartphones can not only connect people to one
another, but also can deliver the full power of online capabilities and experiences, spawning new busi-
ness models as with Uber and Airbnb. In addition, the fact that there are 2 billion smartphones spread
out all over the world, and each one of them can “serve as a digital census-taker,” makes it possible
to get real-time views of what people like and dislike, at a very granular level. But the power of this
framework is limited by the ability to interconnect the devices and web sites—at the necessary inter-
connection speeds and manage the latency requirements for near-instantaneous services. This is made
possible by a transport layer, with adequate bandwidth and throughput between any two end points.
Transport technology has continually evolved from the early local access and long-distance
transport networks. Fundamental advances in the copper, radio, and fiber technologies have pro-
vided cheaper, more durable, and simpler to manage transport. The traffic being transported has
evolved from analog to digital (time division multiplexed) to IP. Layered protocols have enabled
many different services to share a common transport infrastructure. The hub and spoke, fixed band-
width, fixed circuits, and relatively long duration switched sessions (an architecture that grew with
the growth of voice services) are no longer the dominant patterns but one of many different traffic
patterns driven by new applications such as video distribution, Internet access, and machine-to-
machine communication, with mobility being an essential part of the offering. This evolution has
now made it possible for the global telecom network to be the foundation for not just voice, data,
and video communication among people, but also for a rich variety of social and economic activity
transacted by billions of people all over the world. The next thing on the horizon is the Internet of
Things (IoT)—driven by the ability to connect and control tens of billions of remote devices, facili-
tating the next round of productivity gains as operations across multiple industries get streamlined.
Traditionally, the users of carrier networks were fairly static and predictable, as was the traffic
associated with them. As a result, the underlying architecture that carriers relied on at the time was,
more often than not, based on fixed, special purpose, networking hardware. Since the operating
environment within a Telecom operator followed an organizational approach that separated the IT
and Network groups, the growth in traffic and the variety of services that needed to be supported,
created an environment where the ability to respond to business needs was increasingly restricted.
The networks of today support billions of application-heavy, photo-sharing, video-streaming,
mobile devices, and emerging IoT applications, all of which require on-demand scaling, high resil-
iency, and the capability to do on-the-fly service modifications.
Network connectivity is at the core of every innovation these days, from cars to phones to video
and more. Connectivity and network usage are exploding—data traffic on AT&T’s mobile network
alone grew by nearly 150,000% between 2007 and 2014. This trend will continue, with some esti-
mates showing wireless data traffic growing by a factor of 10 by 2020. Video comprises about 60%
of AT&T’s total network traffic—roughly 114 petabytes per day as of this writing. To put that into
perspective, 114 petabytes equals about 130 million hours of HD video. As it stands right now, send-
ing a minute of video takes about 4 megabytes of data. In comparison, sending a minute of virtual
reality (VR) video takes hundreds of megabytes. With VR becoming increasingly popular, having
an easy and convenient way to access this data-hungry content is essential. At the same time, IoT
is also generating mountains of data that have to be stored and analyzed. By 2020, there will be an
estimated 20–50 billion connected devices.
Public networks and especially those that cover large areas have always been expensive to deploy.
To enable the growth and the use of networks (the value of a network increases as more users get
on it), operators have relied on technology advances to continue to improve performance and drive
costs down. Compared to a public network in the twentieth century, today’s all-IP network with
advanced services radically changes many of the requirements. The number of different services or
applications available at any one time has grown by several orders of magnitude and services are
The Need for Change 3

constantly evolving, driven by mobile device capabilities, social media, and value created by avail-
able content and applications.
To keep pace with these new applications, and to be able to provide reliable networking services
in the face of growing traffic and diminishing revenue, we need a new approach to networking.
Traditional telecom network design and implementation has followed a tried and tested approach for
several decades. When new network requirements are identified, a request for proposals (RFPs) is
issued by the carrier. The vendors respond with proprietary solutions that meet interoperability stan-
dards, and each network operator then picks the solution they like. The networks are built by inter-
connecting physical implementation of functions. Today’s telecom networks have over 250 distinct
network functions deployed—switches, routers, access nodes, multiplexors, gateways, servers, etc.
Most of these network functions are implemented as stand-alone appliances—a physical “box” with
unique hardware and software that implements the function and conforms to standard interfaces to
facilitate interoperability with other boxes. For operational ease, network operators prefer to use one
or two vendors, typically, for a given class of appliances (routers, for example). The appliance vendor
often uses custom hardware to optimize the cost/performance; the software is mated with hardware,
and the product can be thought of as “closed.” This creates vendor lock in, and since most deployed
appliances are seldom replaced, the result is a platform lock in, with limited options for upgrading with
technology advances. Figure 1.1 qualitatively depicts the evolution of cost over a 10-year period. For
purposes of illustration, the unit cost signifies the cost for performing one unit of the network func-
tion, (e.g., packet processing cost for 1 GB of IP traffic). Due to platform lock in, any cost improve-
ment comes from either hardware redesigns at the plug-in level with cheaper components, or price
concessions made by the vendor to maintain market position. On the other hand, technology advances
characterized by advances in component technology (Moore’s Law) and competitive market dynam-
ics, facilitate a much faster decline in unit cost, more in-line with what is needed to keep up with the

FIGURE 1.1 Cost evolution.


4 Building the Network of the Future

growth in traffic. A second problem with the current way of network design and implementation is
that in the face of rampant traffic growth, network planners deploy more capacity than what is needed
(since it could take several months to enhance deployed capacity, beyond simple plug add-ons), thus
creating a low utilization rate.
We need to transition from a hardware-centric network design methodology to one that is soft-
ware centric. Wherever possible, the hardware deployed ought to be one that is standardized and
commoditized (cloud hardware, for example) and can be independently upgraded so as to benefit
from technology advances as and when they occur. The network function capability ought to be
largely implemented in software running on the commodity hardware. The hardware is shared
among several network functions, so that we get maximum utilization. Network capacity upgrades
occur in a fluid manner, with continuous deployment of new hardware resources and network func-
tion software as and when needed. In addition, the implementation of software-defined networking
(SDN) would provide three key benefits: (1) separation of the control plane from the data plane
allowing greater operational flexibility; (2) software control of the physical layer enabling real-
time capacity provisioning; and (3) global centralized SDN control with advanced and efficient
algorithms coupled with real-time network data allowing much better multilayer network resource
optimization on routing, traffic engineering, service provisioning, failure restoration, etc. This new
network design methodology (depicted in Figure 1.2) has a much lower cost structure in both capital
outlays and ongoing operating expenses, greater flexibility to react to traffic surges and failures, and
better abilities to create new services.
In order to become a software-centric network, and tap into the full power of SDN, several
steps need to be taken—rethinking the IT/Network separation, disaggregation of hardware and
software, implementing network functions predominantly in software and capable of executing on
a commodity cloud hardware platform, and a high degree of operational automation. Add to this
the requirement that the implementation be done on open source platforms with open Application
Programming Interfaces (APIs).
Today, SDN is commonly perceived to be a new networking paradigm that arose from the vir-
tualization of data-center networks, which in turn was driven by the virtualization of compute and
storage resources. However, SDN techniques have been used at AT&T (and other carriers) for more

FIGURE 1.2 Transforming the network.


The Need for Change 5

than a decade. These techniques have been embedded in the home grown networking architecture
used to create an overlay of network-level intelligence provided by a comprehensive and global view
of not only the network traffic, resources, and policies, but also the customer application’s resources
and policies. The motivation was to enable creation of customer application-aware, value-added
service features that are not inherent in the vendor’s switching equipment. This SDN-like approach
has been repeatedly applied successfully to multiple generations of carrier networking services,
from traditional circuit-switching services through the current IP/Multi-Protocol Label Switching
(MPLS) services.
As computer technology evolved, the telecommunication industry became a large user of com-
puters to automate tasks such as setting up connections. This also launched the first application of
software in telecom—software that allowed the control of the telecommunications specific hard-
ware in the switches. As the number and complexity of the routing decisions grew, there came a
need to increase the flexibility of the network—to make global decisions about routing a call that
could not be done in a distributed fashion. The first “software-defined network controller” was
invented, namely the Network Control Point (NCP). Through a signaling “API,” the controller could
make decisions in real time about whether a request for a call should be accepted, which end point
to route the call to, and who should be billed for the call. These functions could not be implemented
at the individual switch level but needed to be done from a centralized location since the subscriber,
network, and service data were needed to decide how to process the call.
Initially, the NCP was a relatively static service-specific program. It had an application to handle
collect calls, an application for toll-free 800 services, an application for blocking calls from delin-
quent accounts, etc. It soon became clear that many of the service application shared a common set
of functions. The “service logic” was slightly different but there were a set of primitive functions
that the network supported, and a small set of logical steps that tied those functions together. The
data varied and the specific parameters used for a service might vary but there was a reusable set.
The programmable network and, in particular, the programmable network controller was born.3
The Direct Services Dialing Capability (DSDC) network was a new way to do networking.
Switches, known as action points, had an API that could be called over a remote transport network
(CCIS6/SS7) and controllers, known as control points, could invoke the programs in a service exe-
cution environment. The service execution environment was a logical view of the network. Switches
queried controllers, controllers executed the program and called APIs into the switches to bill and
route calls. The controller had a function to set billing parameters and to route calls for basic func-
tions. Advanced functions used APIs to play announcements and collect digits, to look up digits for
validation and conversion, and to temporarily route to a destination and then reroute the call. These
functions allowed different services to be created.
The Toll Free Service (i.e., 800-service) that translated one dialed number into another destination
number and set billing parameters to charge the called party for the call was another example of using
SDN-like techniques in a pre-SDN world. The decisions on which destination number was controlled
by the customer for features such as area code routing, time of day routing, etc. were implemented
using software that controlled the switches. An entire multibillion dollar industry grew out of the
simple concept of reversing the charges and the power of letting the customer decide which data center
to route the call to, for reducing their agent costs or providing better service to their end customers.
For enterprise customers, AT&T provided a trademarked service called AT&T SDN ONENET,
which provided private dialing plans, authentication codes and departmental charging capability
as a virtual Time-Division Multiplexing (TDM) network for enterprise customers. With or with-
out a Private Branch Exchange (PBX), the service exposed a programmable virtual network to
enterprises. The DSDC network also provided the ability to add or remove resources to the call for
advanced functions and mechanisms for dealing with federated controllers. Service Assist was a
mechanism to service-chain an announcement and digit collection node into a call; this grew into
Interactive Voice Response (IVR) technology with speech recognition but it was an early form of
service chaining for virtual networks. When more than one controller was needed to handle the load
6 Building the Network of the Future

(or to perform the entire set of desired features) NCP transfer was used, which today we would see
as controller-to-controller federation. Many variations of these types of service were created, across
the globe, as both the ability for software control and the availability of computing to do more pro-
cessing, allowed the service providers to let their customers manage their business.
These SDN-like networks in the circuit-switched world were followed by a similar capability of
providing network-level intelligent control in the packet-routed world, where the routers replace the
switches. The development and implementation of SDN for AT&T’s IP/MPLS network—­generally
known as the Intelligent Routing Service Control Platform (IRSCP)—was launched in 2004.4 It was
driven with the goal of providing AT&T with “competitive service differentiation” in a ­fast-maturing
and commoditized general IP networking services world. The IRSCP design uses a software-based
network controller to control a set of specially enhanced multiprotocol Border Gateway Protocol
(BGP) (MP-BGP) route reflectors and dynamically distribute selective, fine-grained routing and for-
warding controls to appropriate subsets of IP/MPLS routers. The essential architectural construct
of IRSCP enables on-demand execution of customer-application specific routing and forwarding
treatment of designated traffic flows, with potential control triggers based on any combination of the
network’s and the customer-application’s policies, traffic and resource status, etc. This yields a wide
range of value-added features for many key networking applications such as Content Distribution
Network (CDN), networked-based security (Distributed Denial of Service [DDoS] mitigation),
Virtual Private Cloud, etc.
Apart from SDN, the other key aspect of the transformation is network function virtualization
with transitioning to an architecture that is cloud-centric. AT&T started its own cloud journey in
late 2010 with multiple efforts, each focused on different objectives—a VMware-based cloud for
traditional IT business applications, a Compute-as-a-Service (CaaS) offering for external custom-
ers, and an OpenStack-based effort for internal and external developers. These disparate clouds
were subsequently merged into a common cloud platform, which evolved into the AT&T Integrated
Cloud (AIC). Today, this is the cloud environment in which AT&T’s business applications run. It is
also the platform for the cloud-centric network function virtualization effort. By 2020, it is antici-
pated that 75% of the network would be virtualized and running in the cloud.
The methods and mechanisms for deploying applications on a dedicated server infrastructure are
well known, but a virtualized infrastructure has properties, such as scalability and active reassign-
ment of idle capacity, which are not well understood. If applications are not structured to make use
of these capabilities, they will be more costly and less efficient than the same application running
on a dedicated infrastructure. Building services that are designed around a dedicated infrastructure
concept and deploying them in a virtualized infrastructure fails to exploit the capabilities of the vir-
tualized network. Furthermore, building a virtualized service that makes no use of SDN to provide
flexible routing of messages between service components adds significantly to the complexity of the
solution when compared to a dedicated application. Virtualization and SDN are well defined, but the
key is to enable using virtualization and SDN together to simplify the design of virtualized services.
Integration of virtualization and SDN technologies boils down to understanding how decomposition,
orchestration, virtualization, and SDN can be used together to create, manage, and provide a finished
service to a user. It enables services to be created from modular components described in recipes
where automated creation, scaling, and management are provided by Open Network Automation
Platform (ONAP), an open source software platform that powers AT&Ts SDN. ONAP enables

• Independent management of applications, networking, and physical infrastructure


• A service creation environment that is not limited by a fixed underlying network or com-
pute infrastructure
• The automatic instantiation and scaling of components based on real-time usage
• The efficient reuse of modular application logic
• Automatic configuration of network connectivity via SDN
• User definable services
The Need for Change 7

ONAP will benefit service providers by driving down operations costs. It will also give providers
and businesses greater control of their network services becoming much more “on demand.” At the
end of the day, customers are the ones who will benefit the most. The idea of creating a truly per-
sonalized secure set of services on demand will change the way we enable consumer applications
and business services.
Today’s telecom networks are rich treasure troves of data—especially pertaining to the world of
mobility. On an average day, AT&T measures 1.9 billion network-quality check points from where
our wireless customers are actually using their service. This data go into network analytics to better
understand the customers’ true network experience. The program is internally referred to as Service
Quality Management; sophisticated analytics is used to make sense of this massive volume of net-
work data and discern what customers are experiencing. These technologies have transformed how
we manage our network—driving smarter decisions and resolving issues quicker than ever before.5
For instance, if two areas have disrupted cell towers—restoring service to all customers quickly
is a key operational objective. Based on the real-time data and historical measurements that are
available, AT&T’s home developed algorithm called TONA—the Tower Outage and Network
Analyzer—factors in current users, typical usage for various times of the day, population and posi-
tioning of nearby towers, to assess which towers can respond by off-loading the traffic from the
disrupted towers. TONA has created a 59% improvement in identifying customer impact, and it
shortens the duration of network events for the greatest number of customers. This is but one exam-
ple of the power of using real-time data to improve network performance.
This transformation is not limited to the network and its associated technologies. The transformed
network also needs a software-centric workforce. Reskilling the employees in a variety of software
and data specialties is as important as transforming the architecture of the network. Besides, the tra-
ditional RFP approach, used today to procure new products or introduce new vendors, gets replaced
by a more iterative and continuous approach for specifying and procuring software. It also calls
for active involvement with the open source community.6 Open source speeds up innovation, lower
costs, and helps to converge quickly on a universal solution, embraced by all. Initially conceived to
be something people can modify and share, because the design is publicly accessible, “open source”
has come to represent open exchange, collaborative participation, rapid prototyping, transparency,
meritocracy, and community-oriented development.7 The phenomenal success of the Internet can be
attributed to open source technologies (Linux, Apache Web server application, etc.) Consequently,
anyone who is using the Internet today benefits from open source software. One of the tenets of the
open source community is that you do not just take code. You contribute to it, as well.
AT&T strongly believes that the global telecom industry needs to actively cultivate and nur-
ture open source. To spur this, we have decided to contribute the ONAP platform to open source.
Developed by AT&T and its collaboration partners, the decision to release ONAP into open source
was driven by the desire to have a global standard on which to deliver the next generation of applica-
tions and services. At the time of this writing, there are at least four active open source communities
pertaining to the Network Functions Virtualization (NFV)/SDN effort:

• OpenStack
• ON.Lab
• OpenDaylight
• OPNFV

AT&T has been active in all four, and will continue to do so. Many other telecom companies, as
well as equipment vendors, have also been equally active.
Any significant effort to re-architect the telecom network to be software-centric cannot ignore
the needs of wireless (mobile) systems. The fourth generation wireless system, Long-Term Evolution
(LTE), which was launched in late 2009, made significant advances in the air interface, as well as
the architecture of the core network handling mobile traffic. The driver behind this was the desire to
8 Building the Network of the Future

build a network that was optimized for smartphones and the multitude of applications that runs on
them. As of this writing, fifth generation mobile networks are being architected and designed and
their rollout is expected in 2020. Compared to the existing 4G systems, 5G networks offer

• Average data rate to each device in the range of 50 Mb/s, compared to the current 5 Mb/s
• Peak speeds of up to 1 Gb/s simultaneously to many users in the same local area
• Several hundreds of thousands of simultaneous connections for massive wireless sensor
network
• Enhanced spectral efficiency for existing bands
• New frequency bands with wider bandwidths
• Improved coverage
• Efficient signaling for low latency applications

New use cases such as the IoT, broadcast-like services, low latency applications, and lifeline
communication in times of natural disaster will call for new networking architectures based on
network slicing (reference). NFV and SDN will be an important aspect of 5G systems—for both the
radio access nodes as well as the network core.
The chapters that follow explore the concepts discussed in this chapter, in much more detail. The
transformation that is upon us will achieve hyper scaling, not unlike what the web players have done
for their data centers. We think this is one of the biggest shifts in networking since the creation of
the Internet.

REFERENCES
1. https://www.statista.com/statistics/330695/number-of-smartphone-users-worldwide/
2. http://www.economist.com /news/leaders/21645180-smartphone-ubiquitous-addictive-and-
transformative-planet-phones
3. 800 service using SPC network capability—special issue on stored program controlled network, Bell
System Technical Journal, Volume 61, Number 7, September 1982.
4. J. Van der Merwe et al. Dynamic connectivity management with an intelligent route service control
point, Proceedings of the 2006 SIGCOMM Workshop on Internet Network Management. Pisa, Italy, pp.
147–161.
5. http://about.att.com/innovationblog/121014datapoints
6. http://about.att.com/innovationblog/061714hittingtheopen
7. https://opensource.com/resources/what-open-source
2 Transforming a Modern
Telecom Network—From
All-IP to Network Cloud
Rich Bennett and Steven Nurenberg

CONTENTS
2.1 Introduction...............................................................................................................................9
2.2 Rapid Transition to All-IP....................................................................................................... 10
2.3 The Network Cloud................................................................................................................. 10
2.4 The Modern IP Network.......................................................................................................... 11
2.4.1 The Open Systems for Interconnection Model............................................................ 11
2.4.2 Regulation and Standards............................................................................................ 11
2.5 Transforming an All-IP Network to a Network Cloud............................................................ 12
2.5.1 Network Functions Virtualization (NFV)................................................................... 13
2.5.2 NFV Infrastructure...................................................................................................... 13
2.5.3 Software-Defined Networking..................................................................................... 14
2.5.4 Open Network Automation Platform........................................................................... 15
2.5.5 Network Security......................................................................................................... 15
2.5.6 Enterprise Customer Premises Equipment.................................................................. 16
2.5.7 Network Access........................................................................................................... 17
2.5.8 Network Edge.............................................................................................................. 17
2.5.9 Network Core............................................................................................................... 18
2.5.10 Service Platforms......................................................................................................... 19
2.5.11 Network Data and Measurements................................................................................ 22
2.5.12 Network Operations..................................................................................................... 23
References.........................................................................................................................................24

This chapter provides context for and introduces topics covered in subsequent chapters. We sum-
marize major factors that are driving the transformation of telecom networks, characteristics of a
modern all-IP network, and briefly describe how the characteristics change as an all-IP network
transforms to a Network Cloud. The brief descriptions of change include references to succeeding
chapters that explore each topic in more detail.

2.1 INTRODUCTION
The dawn of the Internet began with industry standards groups such as the International
Telecommunications Union (ITU) and government research projects, such as ARPANET, in the
United States proposing designs based on loosely coupled network layers. The layered design com-
bined with the ARPANET open, pragmatic approach to enhancing or extending the design proved
to have many benefits including the following: integration of distributed networks without central
control; reuse of layers for multiple applications; incremental evolution or substitution of technology

9
10 Building the Network of the Future

without disruption to other layers; and creation of a significant sized network in parallel with the
development of the standards.
Tremendous growth and commercialization of the network was triggered by the ubiquitous
availability of the Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) network stack on
Windows and UNIX servers and the development of web browsers and servers using the Hypertext
Transfer Protocol (HTTP). This convergence of events created the World Wide Web where islands
of information could be linked together by distributed authors and seamlessly accessed by anyone
connected to the Internet. The Public Telecom network became the transport network for Internet
traffic. Analog telephony access circuits were increasingly used with modems for Internet data,
driving redesign or replacement of access to support broadband data. Traffic on core network links
associated with Internet and IP applications grew rapidly.
The IP application protocols were initially defined to support many application types such
as email, instant messaging, file transfer, remote access, file sharing, audio and video streams,
etc. and to consolidate multiple proprietary protocol implementations on common network lay-
ers. As the HTTP protocol became widely used across public and private networks, usage grew
beyond the original use to retrieve HTML Hypertext. HTTP use today includes transport of
many IP application protocols such as a file transfer, the segments of a video stream, application-
to-application programming interfaces, and tunneling or relaying lower level datagram packets
between private networks. A similar evolution happened with mobile networks that started pro-
viding mobile voice and today with 4G Long-Term Evolution (LTE) wireless networks, IP data
are the standard transport and are used for all applications including use for voice telephony. IP
has become the universal network traffic standard and modern telecom networks are moving to
all-IP.

2.2 RAPID TRANSITION TO ALL-IP


The convergence of technologies to all-IP is driving major changes in telecom networks. The price
and performance of mobile computing devices and the emergence of a vibrant open software eco-
system is creating an exponentially increasing demand for mobile applications and data access.
Telecom service providers have made large investments to meet mobile applications demand with
wireless network technologies such as 4G LTE having embraced the use of IP as a foundational
architectural element. The Third Generation Partnership Project (3 GPP) standards provided a blue
print for integrating the existing telecom services and future IP service with an IP multimedia
subsystem (IMS) and alternatives for IP services platforms have emerged from adjacent industries.
Public compute, storage, content delivery clouds accessed via IP protocols have changed the trans-
port usage patterns for both business and consumer users. Business applications leverage shared
resources in the cloud rather than private, distributed data centers and consumers increasingly inter-
act more with the content in the public clouds. Today, a new telecom network, deployed in a “green-
field” fashion, will be exclusively designed, built, and operated in an all-IP manner end to end.

2.3 THE NETWORK CLOUD


The declining significance of transport and emergence of an all-IP network platform with diverse
IP services demand creates an opportunity, or in some cases an imperative, for telecommunications
providers, to remain relevant by embracing a new framework for the delivery of services. The essen-
tial elements of the new framework include refactoring hardware elements into software functions
running on commodity cloud computing infrastructure; aligning access, core, and edge networks
with the traffic patterns created by IP-based services; integrating the network and cloud technolo-
gies on a software platform that enables rapid, highly automated, deployment and management of
services, and software-defined control so that both infrastructure and functions can be optimized
Transforming a Modern Telecom Network—From All-IP to Network Cloud 11

across change in service demand and infrastructure availability; and increasing competencies in
software integration and a DevOps operations model. We call this the “Network Cloud.”
The benefits of a Network Cloud framework include lower unit cost of providing services, faster
delivery and flexibility to support new services compared to the traditional approach (where a spe-
cific service requires dedicated infrastructure with low utilization to ensure high availability), and
the opportunity to automate network operations.

2.4 THE MODERN IP NETWORK


The modern IP network as illustrated in Figure 2.1, is formed using high-capacity fiber optic trans-
mission, optical switching and multiplexing, and packet switching technology. Each of these is
combined to create local, regional, national, and international networks. In the past, virtually all
telecommunications companies tended to specialize in both service type and geographic reach.
With newer technologies, it has become possible to use the same network to offer a range of voice,
video, data, and mobile services leading to significant competition.

2.4.1 The Open Systems for Interconnection Model


The primary model for networking used today is the Open Systems for Interconnection (OSI)
model, which breaks network functionality down into layers (see Figure 2.2). This allows technol-
ogy enhancements and change to occur without disrupting the entire stack (combination of layers).
It also allows interoperation between networks (or network segments) that use dissimilar network-
ing technology as long as they connect using a common interface at one of the layers. This is the
method that allowed the Internet and its lower layer data networks to evolve so quickly. Each of the
different local area networks, or LANs, could evolve as long as they all connected using the com-
mon Internet Protocol.

2.4.2 Regulation and Standards


No matter how organized, telecommunications networks need to be built against a set of standards
in order to provide value. Internationally, the United Nations has historically had an arm called
the ITU that ensured the creation of standards-based telecommunications networks. With the cre-
ation of newer technologies, additional technology groups or consortia were created to facilitate the
advancement of specific approaches. For the Internet, this is the Internet Engineering Task Force
(IETF); for mobile networks, this is the Third Generation Partnership Project or 3GPP.

FIGURE 2.1 Illustration of a modern IP network.


12 Building the Network of the Future

FIGURE 2.2 OSI layers.

To help put the transformation of public networking into context, this chapter describes two
examples—a traditional “appliance”-based network and a contemporary software-defined and vir-
tualized network (software-defined networking [SDN]/NFV) at a high level. This is to convey that
the new SDN/NFV network is more than just faster networking and certainly different than previ-
ous efforts to add intelligence and programmed control.

2.5 TRANSFORMING AN ALL-IP NETWORK TO A NETWORK CLOUD


Since every part of a modern telecom network can be architected to be all-IP, it can also be trans-
formed to a Network Cloud architecture. This transformation needs to be addressed individually
for each of the components of the network—customer premise, access, edge, core, and service
platforms. This is because, the benefits of NFV and the degree of SDN control varies from part to
part. But there is a great deal of commonality—the NFV infrastructure (NFVI), the SDN control
framework, cloud orchestration, network management, security considerations, data collection and
analysis, and a new operations paradigm for the software-controlled network. This is illustrated in
Figure 2.3, where traditional routers are replaced by a network fabric and where the various dedi-
cated elements are replaced by software running on common off the shelf (COTS) servers to imple-
ment the data, control, and management planes.

FIGURE 2.3 Transformation to network cloud.


Transforming a Modern Telecom Network—From All-IP to Network Cloud 13

2.5.1 Network Functions Virtualization (NFV)


Network functions virtualization (NFV) draws equally from information technology (IT) and net-
work. Over the past decade, IT environments have gone through multiple stages of evolution, with
the most recent being the use of virtualization that allows multiple software environments to share
the same compute and storage hardware. The network aspect comes about when this same tech-
nique is applied to functionality used in networking.
In the past, networking functionality was creating using purpose-built equipment that
contained the hardware and software bundled together to meet the customer’s specifications.
Examples include switches/routers (OSI layers 2 and 3), firewalls, session border controllers
(used for voice and media networking), and mobility management entities (MME, used for
signaling in mobile networks). Depending on the equipment, the hardware ranged from being
a basic server, a server with special cards, or a custom-designed element using proprietary
application-specific integration circuits (ASICs). In most cases, the underlying hardware can be
separated from the operating software through an abstraction layer and the hardware platform
deployed could be COTS hardware, which has very low unit cost because of widespread use
across many industries. However, networking does have a requirement for special purpose hard-
ware, either for specific physical interfaces such as optical or radio, or for throughput reasons
(exceeding 10 Gb/s). In these, functional separation can be used to minimize the use of special-
ized hardware.
NFV leverages the IT environment, specifically the cloud paradigm, separating network soft-
ware from hardware and leveraging the fact that today’s modern servers are sufficiently scalable for
most network functions where logic is employed. NFV-related work accelerated when a group of
network operators collaborated with each other on requirements establishing a study group under
the auspices of the European Standards Institute (ETSI).2 This group was established in November
2012 and quickly gathered industry-wide participation from carriers, vendors, chip designers, aca-
demic institutions, and other standards bodies. It laid out the logical framework for NFV and the
critical functional blocks along with their interaction and integration points. Transforming physical
network functions (PNF) into virtualized network functions (VNF) introduces a host of challenges,
which are discussed in more detail in Chapter 3.

2.5.2 NFV Infrastructure
Using the NFV approach, traditional network elements are decomposed into their constituent func-
tional blocks. Traditionally, in a telecom network built with appliances, software is used in two
major ways—network element providers acquire and/or develop the software components to sup-
port the operation and management of the network element, and service providers acquire and/
or develop the software components needed to integrate the network elements into business and
operations support systems (OSS). However, in an NFV model, the potential for greater efficiency
is expected from more standardization and reuse of components that go into the network functions
and as a result, the effort to integrate functions and create and operate services is lower because they
can be supported in a common NFVI platform.
Software plays a very important role in the transformation of a traditional telecom network to
a Network Cloud. The software discipline provides extensible languages and massive collabora-
tion processes that enable solutions to complex problems; reusing solution components to automate
tasks and find information and meaning in large amounts of raw data; and insulating solutions from
current hardware design in a way that allows solutions to evolve independently of hardware and to
benefit from a declining cost curve of commodity computing infrastructure.
In the new architecture, PNF are supplanted by VNF that run on NFVI, which is the heart of the
Network Cloud. Key drivers for the platform are the ability to utilize open source software, create
sharable resources, and provide for the use of modern implementation practices such as continuous
14 Building the Network of the Future

integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD). The Open Stack environment is an obvious choice for
NFVI. Open Stack provides the functionality to schedule compute tasks on servers and administrate
the environment. In addition, it provides a fairly extensive set of features; this is discussed in more
detail in Chapter 4.

2.5.3 Software-Defined Networking


While the general perception is that SDN for networks is a relatively new phenomenon with roots
in data centers, the reality is that telecom networks have been using these techniques for several
decades. An example is the use of techniques to control the data plane in circuit-switched networks,
via the control plane from a controller, to provide 800 number services (for long-distance automatic
routing of calls and reverse billing).
In the Network Cloud, SDN is further advanced by applying these learnings and those from
cloud data centers, to create a layered distributed control framework. A “master” (or global) con-
troller that has a network-wide view of connectivity, controls subsidiary controllers associated with
different functional parts of the network. Each controller may also be replicated for scale. For the
IP/Multiple Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) network fabric, the Network Cloud uses a hybrid
approach retaining distributed control planes and protocols for responsiveness and using the cen-
tralized control plane for optimization and complex control.
One very unique aspect of Network Cloud SDN is the shift to model-driven software and net-
work configuration. In the past, these tasks were done by creating detailed requirements documents
that network engineers then had to translate into the specific vendor configuration language of the
associated network element. Any introduction of new network capabilities took extra time waiting
for documentation, testing configuration, and implementing the configuration in OSS. The new pro-
cess involves defining capabilities using the Yet Another Next Generation (YANG) modeling lan-
guage.1 YANG templates, which are vendor neutral, create a portable and more easily maintained
definitive representation of desired network functionality. Another benefit is that simulation can be
used to verify correctness before using the templates with actual network functionality.
In AT&T’s approach to SDN, all SDN controllable elements are treated similarly, whether they
are implemented as classic PNF or the more modern virtualized network functions (VNF). The
Network Cloud SDN controller has a number of subsystems and is designed to operate in conjunc-
tion with the Open Network Automation Platform (ONAP). It combines a service logic interpreter
(SLI) with a real-time controller based on Open Daylight (ODL) components. The SLI executes
scripts that define actions taken on lifecycle events such as service requests and closed-loop con-
trol events. SLI scripts that are frequently used or complex can be encapsulated as a java class that
runs in the ODL framework then reused as a single script operation. Another function is network
resource autonomous control, which is used to associate (assign) network resources with service
instances.
At the bottom of the controller are adapters that can interact with a wide variety of network
element control interfaces. These can range from older element management system (EMS) style
“provisioning” to real-time network transactions using Border Gateway Protocol (BGP).
No control framework would be complete without a policy function. Policy rules can be defined
based on events collected from NFVI and services running on it. Events can trigger changes in
algorithms at enforcement points in and/or control actions on the NFVI/SDN Network Cloud. For
example, a high utilization of a network link might trigger a traffic engineering (TE) routing change
or an unresponsive service function might trigger a restart of the service function.
Using the advanced SDN controller capabilities, it is possible to create not only conventional
network services such as Internet, virtual private networks, real-time media services, etc., but also
more complex on-demand services. Examples described in more detail in Chapter 6 are VPN ser-
vice ordering, bandwidth calendaring, and flow redirection.
Transforming a Modern Telecom Network—From All-IP to Network Cloud 15

2.5.4 Open Network Automation Platform


The movement to network functions virtualization changes many aspects of the way network infra-
structure and services are managed over the life cycle of operation. The initial design of a service
is no longer a vertically integrated optimized infrastructure, but must assume use of a distributed
cloud hardware infrastructure and reuse network functions from any source that best meets the
needs in the service design. The initial installation, configuration, turn up, and then changes in
response to lifecycle events must be formally described in ways that can be automated such as
defining work flows and actions that reference run-time sources of information and adjust use of
infrastructure resources. The infrastructure as well as the service functions must expose software
interfaces that allow monitoring, external control, and specification of policies that change run-time
behavior. Both short-term TE and long-term capacity planning decisions must consider a broad
range of services and scenarios making use of the common infrastructure.
Traditional operations support systems (OSS) and business support systems (BSS) were
designed to integrate monolithic network element components and to add capabilities necessary to
deliver and support the operation of customer services. This approach has a number of limitations.
Network element components lack standard interfaces for some lifecycle operations and tend to be
optimized for a particular service or not easily shared across different services. This increases cost
and time to perform lifecycle operations such as initial delivery, upgrades, routine maintenance,
repair of faults, etc. and requires dedicated infrastructure and skills. The time to design, integrate,
and deploy infrastructure with staff trained to operate it at scale limits the flexibility of a service
provider to deliver new services. New or emerging service volumes and uncertainty of growth
make it hard to justify the investment and the long lead time to deliver increases risk of missing
market opportunities.
The ETSI NFV2 effort described above produced a specification for VNF management and
orchestration (MANO). ONAP expands on ETSI MANO by adding a comprehensive service design
studio to onboard resources, create services, and define lifecycle operations; closed-loop control
based on telemetry, analytics, and policy-driven lifecycle management actions; a model-driven plat-
form to accelerate and reduce costs of onboarding functions and eliminate VNF-specific manage-
ment systems; and support for PNF.
A consistent plan that includes both how ONAP capabilities replace traditional OSS/BSS sys-
tems such as fault correlation, performance analysis, and element management and how these tradi-
tional systems are phased out is critical for the transition period where there is a mix of traditional
physical network (PNF) and new virtualized (VNF) infrastructure. Without a clear plan for both,
there is a risk that traditional systems and design assumptions get integrated with service designs
on the ONAP platform, thus decreasing the benefit of highly automated operation and increasing
maintenance costs.
Chapter 6 describes the ONAP software platform that supports the design and operation of ser-
vices in a Network Cloud. This platform is visible as APIs to software designers and develop-
ers creating services and virtual functions; operations to view data exposed on the run-time state,
events, and performance; to business and OSS that interact with real-time events; and customers in
using, higher level interfaces where they need to configure services and integrate with their private
infrastructure.

2.5.5 Network Security
Security for networks is a multidisciplinary problem—starting with the classic security problems
such as confidentiality and integrity, coupled with the problem of availability, that is, ensuring the
service and network work, and can withstand a hostile attempt to bring it down. With Network
Cloud, there is the need to understand security through the combined lens of software and network,
in an operating cloud environment. For example, using the security technique of “defense in depth”
16 Building the Network of the Future

and “separations of concerns,” it is a pragmatic approach to categorize VNF keeping each category
type from running on the same server simultaneously. For these and other reasons, security is a key
architecture and design factor for the Network Cloud.
Security manifests itself from two different perspectives—the protection of the infrastructure
itself and the ability to deliver security functionality in a service. The basic structure for infrastruc-
ture security is to ensure each component is individually assessed and designed with security in
mind. For the Network Cloud, the fabric component contains functionality such as access control
lists (ACLs) and virtual private networks to limit and separate traffic flows. The servers run operat-
ing systems with hypervisors that provide separate execution environments with memory isolation.
Around this, operational networks are used to provide access to managements ports and use fire-
walls to provide a point of control and inspection.
Other aspects of security architecture also come into play. While the desire is to prevent a secu-
rity problem, a good security approach also provides mechanisms for mitigation, recovery, and
forensics. Mitigation approaches for infrastructure include overload controls and diversion capabili-
ties. Overload controls (which also help in the case of network problems) prioritize functionality
so that resources are best applied to control plane and high priority traffic. Diversion is the ability,
typically using specific portions of the IP header to identify candidate network traffic, to redirect
packets for subsequent processing, rate limiting, and when necessary, elimination.
Forensics is fundamental to security. The ability to log activity provides the ability to analyze
past incidents to determine root cause and to develop prevention and mitigation solutions. It also
plays a role in active security enforcement by acting as an additional point of behavior inspection,
which may indicate either the failure or a weakness in the security design or implementation.
Within security processes, two key components are automation and identity management.
Automation allows for the administration of complex sequences and eliminates the human element
from configuration that is a typical source of security problems. All it takes is entering the wrong
IP address in an ACL to create a vulnerability. Identity management ensures that both people and
software are authorized to view, create, delete, or change records or settings. The Network Cloud
uses a centralized approach for identity verification. This prevents another weakness of local pass-
words, which are more easily compromised. These topics are discussed in more detail in Chapter 9.

2.5.6 Enterprise Customer Premises Equipment


Enterprise networks are the environment that businesses use to tie together their people, IT, and
operating infrastructures. From offices, warehouses, factories, and on-the-go people in trucks, cars,
and while visiting their customers, enterprises need comprehensive solutions for communications.
Typically, they use a range of voice, video, data, and mobile services. All of their operating loca-
tions need some form of on-premises equipment, called customer premises equipment (CPE). In the
past, CPE followed the same approach as network equipment, that is, implemented as appliances.
However, CPE is undergoing the same transformation using NFV. This allows a single device to
provide multiple functions when needed, under software control.
When redesigning CPE using NFV, the approach taken was to allow functions to operate either
on the premise inside the new virtualized CPE or in the network, on the Network Cloud. For the on-
premises network functions within the CPE, innovation was required to create a suitable execution
environment. Unlike the Network Cloud where multiple servers are available to scale up or down
VNF, the CPE environment is limited to typically a single CPU chipset. To allow for software porta-
bility and to leverage the open source ecosystem, again Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) was
selected as the hypervisor to allow multiple VNF to share the CPU in individual virtual machines.
(There are less security concerns here since CPE is dedicated to a single customer.)
One of the most challenging aspects for CPE is management. Since CPE is located on-premises
at the point between the end of a customer’s wide area network (WAN) service and the local
network, it is important to provide an operational network connection capability. This is done by
Another random document with
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elected to Congress and was re-elected in 1804. In 1805, he was
appointed United States District Judge for the new Territory of
Louisiana, now the State of Missouri.
Dr. Felix Brunot arrived in Pittsburgh in 1797. He came from
France with Lafayette and was a surgeon in the Revolutionary War
and fought in many of its battles. His office was located on Liberty
Street, although he owned and lived on Brunot Island. An émigré,
66
the Chevalier Dubac, was a merchant. Dr. F. A. Michaux, the
67
French naturalist and traveler, related of Dubac: “I frequently saw
M. Le Chevalier Dubac, an old French officer who, compelled by the
events of the Revolution to quit France, settled in Pittsburgh where
he engaged in commerce. He possesses very correct knowledge of
the Western country, and is perfectly acquainted with the navigation
of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, having made several voyages to
New Orleans.” Morgan Neville a son of Colonel Presley Neville, and
a writer of acknowledged ability, drew a charming picture of Dubac’s
68
life in Pittsburgh.
Perhaps the best known Frenchman in Pittsburgh was John
Marie, the proprietor of the tavern on Grant’s Hill. Grant’s Hill was the
eminence which adjoined the town on the east, the ascent to the hill
beginning a short distance west of Grant Street. The tavern was
located just outside of the borough limits, at the northeast corner of
Grant Street and the Braddocksfield Road, where it connected with
Fourth Street. The inclosure contained more than six acres, and was
called after the place of its location, “Grant’s Hill.” It overlooked
Pittsburgh, and its graveled walks and cultivated grounds were the
resort of the townspeople. For many years it was the leading tavern.
Gallatin, who was in Pittsburgh, in 1787, while on the way from New
Geneva to Maine, noted in his diary that he passed Christmas Day at
69
Marie’s house, in company with Brackenridge and Peter Audrian, a
well-known French merchant on Water Street. Marie’s French
nationality naturally led him to become a Republican when the party
was formed, and his tavern was long the headquarters of that party.
Numerous Republican plans for defeating their opponents originated
in Marie’s house, and many Republican victories were celebrated in
his rooms. Also in this tavern the general meetings of the militia
70
officers were held. Michaux has testified that Marie kept a good
71
inn. The present court house, the combination court house and city
hall now being erected, and a small part of the South School, the first
public school in Pittsburgh, occupy the larger portion of the site of
“Grant’s Hill.”
Marie’s name became well known over the State, several years
after he retired to private life. He was seventy-five years of age in
1802, when he discontinued tavern-keeping and sold “Grant’s Hill” to
James Ross, United States Senator from Pennsylvania, who was a
resident of Pittsburgh. Marie had been estranged from his wife for a
number of years and by some means she obtained possession of
“Grant’s Hill,” of which Ross had difficulty in dispossessing her. In
1808, Ross was a candidate for governor against Simon Snyder.
Ross’s difference with Mrs. Marie, whose husband had by this time
divorced her, came to the knowledge of William Duane in
Philadelphia, the brilliant but unscrupulous editor of the Aurora since
the discontinuance of the National Gazette, in 1793, the leading
radical Republican newspaper in the country. The report was
enlarged into a scandal of great proportions both in the Aurora and in
a pamphlet prepared by Duane and circulated principally in
Philadelphia. The title of the pamphlet was harrowing. It was called
“The Case of Jane Marie, Exhibiting the Cruelty and Barbarous
Conduct of James Ross to a Defenceless Woman, Written and
Published by the Object of his Cruelty and Vengeance.” Although
Marie was opposed to Ross politically, he defended his conduct
toward Mrs. Marie as being perfectly honorable. Nevertheless, the
pamphlet played an important part in obtaining for Snyder the
majority of twenty-four thousand by which he defeated Ross.
Notwithstanding the high positions which some of the
Frenchmen attained, they left no permanent impression in
Pittsburgh. After prospering there for a few years, they went away
and no descendants of theirs reside in the city unless it be some of
the descendants of Dr. Brunot. Some went south to the Louisiana
country, and others returned to France. Gallatin, himself, long after
he had shaken the dust of Western Pennsylvania from his feet,
writing about his grandson, the son of his son James, said: “He is the
only young male of my name, and I have hesitated whether, with a
view to his happiness, I had not better take him to live and die quietly
at Geneva, rather than to leave him to struggle in this most energetic
country, where the strong in mind and character overset everybody
else, and where consideration and respectability are not at all in
72
proportion to virtue and modest merit.” And the grandson went to
73
Geneva to live, and his children were born there and he died there.
The United States Government was still in the formative stage.
Until this time the men who had fought the Revolutionary War to a
successful conclusion, held a tight rein on the governmental
machinery. Now a new element was growing up, and, becoming
dissatisfied with existing conditions, organized for a conflict with the
men in power. The rise of the opposition to the Federal party was
also the outcome of existing social conditions. Like the modern cry
against consolidated wealth, the movement was a contest by the
discontented elements in the population, of the men who had little
against those who had more. Abuses committed by individuals and
conditions common to new countries were magnified into errors of
government. Also the people were influenced by the radicalism
superinduced by the French Revolution and the subsequent
happenings in France. “Liberty, fraternity, and equality” were enticing
catchwords in the United States.
Thomas Jefferson, on his return from France, in 1789, after an
absence of six years, where he had served as United States
Minister, during the development of French radicalism, came home
much strengthened in his ideas of liberty. They were in strong
contrast with the more conservative notions of government
entertained by Washington, Vice-President Adams, Hamilton, and
the other members of the Cabinet. In March, 1790, Jefferson
became Secretary of State in Washington’s first Cabinet, the
appointment being held open for him since April 13th of the
preceding year, when Washington entered on the duties of the
Presidency. Jefferson’s views being made public, he immediately
became the deity of the radical element. At the close of 1793, the
dissensions in the Cabinet had become so acute that on December
31st Jefferson resigned in order to be better able to lead the new
party which was being formed. By this element the Federalists were
termed “aristocrats,” and “tories.” They were charged with being
traitors to their country, and were accused of being in league with
England, and to be plotting for the establishment of a monarchy, and
an aristocracy. The opposition party assumed the title of
“Republican.” Later the word “Democratic” was prefixed and the
74
party was called “Democratic Republican,” although in Pittsburgh
for many years the words “Republican,” “Democratic Republican,”
and “Democratic” were used interchangeably.
Heretofore Pennsylvania had been staunchly Federal. On the
organization of the Republican party, Governor Thomas Mifflin, and
Chief Justice Thomas McKean of the Supreme Court, the two most
popular men in the State, left the Federal party and became
Republicans. There was also a cause peculiar to Pennsylvania, for
the rapid growth of the Republican party in the State. The constant
increase in the backwoods population consisted largely of emigrants
from Europe, chiefly from Ireland, who brought with them a bitter
hatred of England and an intense admiration for France. They went
almost solidly into the Republican camp. The arguments of the
Republicans had a French revolutionary coloring mingled with which
were complaints caused by failure to realize expected conditions. An
address published in the organ of the Republican party in Pittsburgh
is a fair example of the reasoning employed in advocacy of the
Republican candidates: “Albert Gallatin, the friend of the people, the
enemy of tyrants, is to be supported on Tuesday, the 14th of October
next, for the Congress of the United States. Fellow citizens, ye who
are opposed to speculators, land jobbers, public plunderers, high
taxes, eight per cent. loans, and standing armies, vote for Mr.
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Gallatin!”
In Pittsburgh the leader of the Republicans was Hugh Henry
Brackenridge, the lawyer and dilettante in literature. In the fierce
invective of the time, he and all the members of his party were styled
by their opponents “Jacobins,” after the revolutionary Jacobin Club of
France, to which all the woes of the Terror were attributed. The
Pittsburgh Gazette referred to Brackenridge as “Citizen
Brackenridge,” and after the establishment of the Tree of Liberty,
added “Jacobin printer of the Tree of Sedition, Blasphemy, and
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Slander.” But the Republicans gloried in titles borrowed from the
French Revolution. The same year that Governor Mifflin and Chief
Justice McKean went over to the Republicans, Brackenridge made a
Fourth of July address in Pittsburgh, in which he advocated closer
relations with France. This was republished in New York by the
Republicans, in a pamphlet, along with a speech made by
Maximilien Robespierre in the National Convention of France. In this
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pamphlet Brackenridge was styled “Citizen Brackenridge.” The
Pittsburgh Gazette and the Tree of Liberty, contained numerous
references to meetings and conferences held at the tavern of
“Citizen” Marie. On March 4, 1802, the first anniversary of the
inauguration of Jefferson as President, a dinner was given by the
leading Republicans in the tavern of “Citizen” Jeremiah Sturgeon, at
the “Sign of the Cross Keys,” at the northwest corner of Wood Street
and Diamond Alley, at which toasts were drunk to “Citizen” Thomas
Jefferson, “Citizen” Aaron Burr, “Citizen” James Madison, “Citizen”
78
Albert Gallatin, and “Citizen” Thomas McKean.
In 1799, the Republicans had as their candidate for governor
Chief Justice McKean. Opposed to him was Senator James Ross.
Ross was required to maintain a defensive campaign. The fact that
he was a Federalist was alone sufficient to condemn him in the eyes
of many of the electors. He was accused of being a follower of
Thomas Paine, and was charged with “singing psalms over a card
table.” It was said that he had “mimicked” the Rev. Dr. John
McMillan, the pioneer preacher of Presbyterianism in Western
Pennsylvania, and a politician of no mean influence; that he had
“mocked” the Rev. Matthew Henderson, a prominent minister of the
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Associate Presbyterian Church. Although Allegheny County gave
Ross a majority of over eleven hundred votes, he was defeated in
80
the State by more than seventy-nine hundred. McKean took office
81
on December 17, 1799, and the next day he appointed
Brackenridge a justice of the Supreme Court. All but one or two of
the county offices were filled by appointment of the governor, who
could remove the holders at pleasure. The idea of public offices
being public trusts had not been formulated. The doctrine afterward
attributed to Andrew Jackson, that “to the victors belong the spoils of
office,” was already a dearly cherished principle of the Republicans,
and Judge Brackenridge was not an exception to his party. Hardly
had he taken his seat on the Supreme Bench, when he induced
Governor McKean to remove from office the Federalist prothonotary,
James Brison, who had held the position since September 26, 1788,
two days after the organization of the county.
Brison was very popular. As a young man, he had lived at
Hannastown, and during the attack of the British and Indians on the
place had been one of the men sent on the dangerous errand of
82
reconnoitering the enemy. He was now captain of the Pittsburgh
Troop of Light Dragoons, the crack company in the Allegheny County
brigade of militia, and was Secretary of the Board of Trustees of the
Academy. He was a society leader and generally managed the larger
social functions of the town. General Henry Lee, the Governor of
Virginia, famous in the annals of the Revolutionary War, as “Light-
Horse Harry Lee,” commanded the expedition sent by President
Washington to suppress the Whisky Insurrection, and was in
Pittsburgh several weeks during that memorable campaign. On the
eve of his departure a ball was given in his honor by the citizens. On
that occasion Brison was master of ceremonies. A few months
earlier Brackenridge had termed him “a puppy and a coxcomb.”
Brackenridge credited Brison with retaliating for the epithet, by
neglecting to provide his wife and himself with an invitation to the
ball. This was an additional cause for his dismissal, and toward the
close of January the office was given to John C. Gilkison. Gilkison
who was a relative of Brackenridge, conducted the bookstore and
library which he had opened the year before, and also followed the
occupation of scrivener, preparing such legal papers as were
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demanded of him.
REFERENCES
Chapter III

58
Pittsburgh Gazette, January 23, 1801.
59
Collinson Read. An Abridgment of the Laws of
Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, MDCCCI, pp. 264–269.
60
Pittsburgh Gazette, December 7, 1799.
61
Neville B. Craig. The Olden Time, Pittsburgh, 1848, vol. ii.,
pp. 354–355.
62
A Brief State of the Province of Pennsylvania, London,
1755, p. 12.
63
Tree of Liberty, December 27, 1800.
64
John Austin Stevens. Albert Gallatin, Boston, 1895, p.
370.
65
Major Ebenezer Denny. Military Journal, Philadelphia,
1859, p. 21.
66
Pittsburgh Gazette, October 23, 1801.
67
Dr. F. A. Michaux. Travels to the Westward of the Alleghany
Mountains in the Year 1802, London, 1805, p. 36.
68
Morgan Neville. In John F. Watson’s Annals of
Philadelphia and Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, 1891, vol.
ii., pp. 132–135.
69
Henry Adams. The Life of Albert Gallatin, Philadelphia,
1880, p. 68.
70
Tree of Liberty, November 7, 1800; Pittsburgh Gazette,
February 20, 1801.
71
Dr. F. A. Michaux. Travels to the Westward of the Alleghany
Mountains in the Year 1802, London, 1805, p. 29.
72
Henry Adams. The Life of Albert Gallatin, Philadelphia,
1880, p. 650.
73
Count De Gallatin. “A Diary of James Gallatin in Europe”;
Scribner’s Magazine, New York, vol. lvi., September,
1914, pp. 350–351.
74
Richard Hildreth. The History of the United States of
America, New York, vol. iv., p. 425.
75
Tree of Liberty, September 27, 1800.
76
Pittsburgh Gazette, February 6, 1801.
77
Political Miscellany, New York, 1793, pp. 27–31.
78
Tree of Liberty, March 13, 1802.
79
Tree of Liberty, September 19, 1801.
80
Pittsburgh Gazette, October 26, 1799.
81
William C. Armor. Lives of the Governors of Pennsylvania,
Philadelphia, 1873, p. 289.
82
Neville B. Craig. The Olden Time, Pittsburgh, 1848, vol. ii.,
p. 355.
83
H. M. Brackenridge. Recollections of Persons and Places
in the West, Philadelphia, 1868, p. 68; Pittsburgh
Gazette, December 29, 1798.
CHAPTER IV
LIFE AT THE BEGINNING OF THE NINETEENTH
CENTURY

The Pittsburgh Gazette was devoted to the interests of the


Federal party, and Brackenridge and the other leading Republicans
felt the need of a newspaper of their own. The result was the
establishment on August 16, 1800, of the Tree of Liberty, by John
Israel, who was already publishing a newspaper, called the Herald of
Liberty, in Washington, Pennsylvania. The title of the new paper was
intended to typify its high mission. The significance of the name was
further indicated in the conspicuously displayed motto, “And the
leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.” The
Federalists, and more especially their organ, the Pittsburgh
84
Gazette, charged Brackenridge with being the owner of the new
paper, and with being responsible for its utterances. Brackenridge,
however, has left a letter in which he refuted this statement, and
alleged that originally he intended to establish a newspaper, but on
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hearing of Israel’s intention gave up the idea.
The extent of the comforts and luxuries enjoyed in Pittsburgh
was surprising. The houses, whether built of logs, or frame, or brick,
were comfortable, even in winter. In the kitchens were large open
fire-places, where wood was burned. The best coal fuel was plentiful.
Although stoves were invented barely half a century earlier, and
were in general use only in the larger cities, the houses in Pittsburgh
could already boast of many. There were cannon stoves, so called
because of their upright cylindrical, cannon-like shape, and Franklin
or open stoves, invented by Benjamin Franklin; the latter graced the
parlor. Grates were giving out their cheerful blaze. They were also in
use in some of the rooms of the new court house, and in the new jail.
The advertisements of the merchants told the story of what the
people ate and drank, and of the materials of which their clothing
was made. Articles of food were in great variety. In the stores were
tea, coffee, red and sugar almonds, olives, chocolate, spices of all
kinds, muscatel and keg raisins, dried peas, and a score of other
luxuries, besides the ordinary articles of consumption. The gentry of
England, as pictured in the pages of the old romances, did not have
a greater variety of liquors to drink. There were Madeira, sherry,
claret, Lisbon, port, and Teneriffe wines, French and Spanish
86 87
brandies, Jamaica and antique spirits. Perrin DuLac, who visited
Pittsburgh in 1802, said these liquors were the only articles sold in
88
the town that were dear. But not all partook of the luxuries. Bread
and meat, and such vegetables as were grown in the neighborhood,
constituted the staple articles of food, and homemade whisky was
the ordinary drink of the majority of the population. The native fruits
were apples and pears, which had been successfully propagated
89
since the early days of the English occupation.
Materials for men’s and women’s clothing were endless in variety
and design and consisted of cloths, serges, flannels, brocades,
jeans, fustians, Irish linens, cambrics, lawns, nankeens, ginghams,
muslins, calicos, and chintzes. Other articles were tamboured
petticoats, tamboured cravats, silk and cotton shawls, wreaths and
plumes, sunshades and parasols, black silk netting gloves, white and
salmon-colored long and short gloves, kid and morocco shoes and
slippers, men’s beaver, tanned, and silk gloves, men’s cotton and
thread caps, and silk and cotton hose.
Men were changing their dress along with their political opinions.
One of the consequences in the United States of the French
Revolution was to cause the effeminate and luxurious dress in
general use to give way to simpler and less extravagant attire. The
rise of the Republican party and the class distinctions which it was
responsible for engendering, more than any other reason, caused
the men of affairs—the merchants, the manufacturers, the lawyers,
the physicians, and the clergymen—to discard the old fashions and
adopt new ones. Cocked hats gave way to soft or stiff hats, with low
square crowns and straight brims. The fashionable hats were the
beaver made of the fur of the beaver, the castor made of silk in
imitation of the beaver, and the roram made of felt, with a facing of
beaver fur felted in. Coats of blue, green, and buff, and waistcoats of
crimson, white, or yellow, were superseded by garments of soberer
colors. Coats continued to be as long as ever, but the tails were cut
away in front. Knee-breeches were succeeded by tight-fitting
trousers reaching to the ankles; low-buckled shoes, by high-laced
leather shoes, or boots. Men discontinued wearing cues, and their
hair was cut short, and evenly around the head. There were of
course exceptions. Many men of conservative temperament still
clung to the old fashions. A notable example in Pittsburgh was the
Rev. Robert Steele, who always appeared in black satin knee-
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breeches, knee-buckles, silk stockings, and pumps.
The farmers on the plantations surrounding Pittsburgh and the
mechanics in the borough were likewise affected by the movement
for dress reform. Their apparel had always been less picturesque
than that of the business and professional men. Now the ordinary
dress of the farmers and mechanics consisted of short tight-fitting
round-abouts, or sailor’s jackets, made in winter of cloth or linsey,
and in summer of nankeen, dimity, gingham, or linen. Sometimes the
jacket was without sleeves, the shirt being heavy enough to afford
protection against inclement weather. The trousers were loose-fitting
and long, and extended to the ankles, and were made of nankeen,
tow, or cloth. Some men wore blanket-coats. Overalls, of dimity,
nankeen, and cotton, were the especial badge of mechanics. The
shirt was of tow or coarse linen, the vest of dimity. On their feet,
farmers and mechanics alike wore coarse high-laced shoes, half-
boots, or boots made of neat’s leather. The hats were soft, of fur or
wool, and were low and round-crowned, or the crowns were high and
square.
The inhabitants of Pittsburgh were pleasure-loving, and the time
not devoted to business was given over to the enjoyments of life.
Men and women alike played cards. Whisk, as whist was called, and
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Boston were the ordinary games. All classes and nationalities
danced, and dancing was cultivated as an art. Dancing masters
came to Pittsburgh to give instructions, and adults and children alike
took lessons. In winter public balls and private assemblies were
given. The dances were more pleasing to the senses than any ever
seen in Pittsburgh, except the dances of the recent revival of the art.
The cotillion was executed by an indefinite number of couples, who
performed evolutions or figures as in the modern german. Other
dances were the minuet, the menuet à la cour, and jigs. The country
dance, generally performed by eight persons, four men and four
women, comprised a variety of steps, and a surprising number of
evolutions, of which liveliness was the characteristic.
The taverns had rooms set apart for dances. The “Sign of the
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Green Tree,” had an “Assembly Room”; the “Sign of General
93 94
Butler” and the “Sign of the Waggon” each had a “Ball Room.”
The small affairs were given in the homes of the host or hostess, and
the large ones in the taverns, or in the grand-jury room of the new
court house.
The dancing masters gave “Practicing Balls” at which the
cotillion began at seven o’clock, and the ball concluded with the
95
country dance, which was continued until twelve o’clock. Dancing
became so popular and to such an extent were dancing masters in
the eyes of the public that William Irwin christened his race horse
96
“Dancing Master.” The ball given to General Lee was talked about
for years after the occurrence. Its beauties were pictured by many
fair lips. The ladies recalled the soldierly bearing of the guest of
honor, the tall robust form of General Daniel Morgan, Lee’s second
in command, and the commander of the Virginia troops, famous as
the hero of Quebec and Saratoga, who had received the thanks of
Congress for his victory at Cowpens. They dwelt on the varicolored
uniforms of the soldiers, the bright colors worn by the civilians, their
powdered hair, the brocades, and silks, and velvets of the ladies.
In winter evenings there were concerts and theatrical
performances which were generally given in the new court house. A
unique concert was that promoted by Peter Declary. It was heralded
as a musical event of importance. Kotzwara’s The Battle of Prague,
was performed on the “forte piano” by one of Declary’s pupils,
advertised as being only eight years of age; President Jefferson’s
march was another conspicuous feature. The exhibition concluded
97
with a ball.
Comedy predominated in the theatrical performances. The
players were “the young gentlemen of the town.” At one of the
entertainments they gave John O’Keefe’s comic opera The Poor
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Soldier, and a farce by Arthur Murphy called The Apprentice.
There were also performances of a more professional character.
Bromley and Arnold, two professional actors, conducted a series of
theatrical entertainments extending over a period of several weeks.
The plays which they rendered are hardly known to-day. At a single
99
performance they gave a comedy entitled Trick upon Trick, or The
Vintner in the Suds; a farce called The Jealous Husband, or The
Lawyer in the Sack; and a pantomime, The Sailor’s Landlady, or
Jack in Distress. Another play in the series was Edward Moore’s
100
tragedy, The Gamester.
Much of Grant’s Hill was unenclosed. Clumps of trees grew on
its irregular surface, and there were level open spaces; and in
summer the place was green with grass, and bushes grew in
profusion. Farther in the background were great forest trees. The hill
was the pleasure ground of the village. Judge Henry M.
Brackenridge, a son of Judge Hugh Henry Brackenridge dwelling on
the past, declared that “it was pleasing to see the line of well-
dressed ladies and gentlemen and children, ... repairing to the
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beautiful green eminence.” On this elevation “under a bower, on
the margin of a wood, and near a delightful spring, with the town of
102
Pittsburgh in prospect,” the Fourth of July celebrations were held.
On August 2, 1794, the motley army of Insurgents from
Braddocksfield rested there, after having marched through the town.
Here they were refreshed with food and whisky, in order that they
103
might keep in good humor, and to prevent their burning the town.
Samuel Jones has left an intimate, if somewhat regretful account
of the early social life of Pittsburgh. “The long winter evenings,” he
wrote, “were passed by the humble villagers at each other’s homes,
with merry tale and song, or in simple games; and the hours of night
sped lightly onward with the unskilled, untiring youth, as they
threaded the mazes of the dance, guided by the music of the violin,
from which some good-humored rustic drew his Orphean sounds. In
the jovial time of harvest and hay-making, the sprightly and active of
the village participated in the rural labors and the hearty pastimes,
which distinguished that happy season. The balls and merry-
makings that were so frequent in the village were attended by all
without any particular deference to rank or riches. No other etiquette
than that which natural politeness prescribed was exacted or
expected.... Young fellows might pay their devoirs to their female
acquaintances; ride, walk, or talk with them, and pass hours in their
society without being looked upon with suspicion by parents, or
104
slandered by trolloping gossips.”
The event of autumn was the horse races, which lasted three
days. They were held in the northeasterly extremity of the town
105
between Liberty Street and the Allegheny River, and were
conducted under the auspices of the Jockey Club which had been in
existence for many years. Sportsmen came from all the surrounding
country. The races were under the saddle, sulkies not having been
invented. Racing proprieties were observed, and jockeys were
106
required to be dressed in jockey habits. Purses were given. The
horses compared favorably with race horses of a much later day. A
prominent horse was “Young Messenger” who was sired by
“Messenger,” the most famous trotting horse in America, which had
been imported into Philadelphia from England in 1788, and was the
progenitor of Rysdyk’s Hambletonian, Abdallah, Goldsmith Maid, and
a score of other noted race horses.
A third of a century after the race course had been removed
beyond the limits of the municipality, Judge Henry M. Brackenridge
published his recollections of the entrancing sport. “It was then an
affair of all-engrossing interest, and every business or pursuit was
neglected.... The whole town was daily poured forth to witness the
Olympian games.... The plain within the course and near it was filled
with booths as at a fair, where everything was said, and done, and
sold, and eaten or drunk, where every fifteen or twenty minutes there
was a rush to some part, to witness a fisticuff—where dogs barked
and bit, and horses trod on men’s toes, and booths fell down on
107
people’s heads!”
The social instincts of the people found expression in another
direction. The Revolutionary War, the troubles with the Indians, the
more or less strained relations existing between France and
England, had combined to inbreed a military spirit. Pennsylvania,
with a population, in 1800, of 602,365, had enrolled in the militia
88,707 of its citizens. The militia was divided into light infantry,
108
riflemen, grenadiers, cavalry, and artillery. Allegheny County had
109
a brigade of militia, consisting of eight regiments. The
commander was General Alexander Fowler, an old Englishman who
had served in America, in the 18th, or Royal Irish, Regiment of Foot.
On the breaking out of the Revolutionary War, he had resigned his
commission on account of his sympathy with the Americans. Being
unfit for active service, Congress appointed him Auditor of the
Western Department at Pittsburgh.
The militia had always been more or less permeated with
partisan politics. During the Revolution the American officers wore a
cockade with a black ground and a white relief, called the black
cockade. This the Federalists had made their party emblem. The
Republican party, soon after its organization, adopted as a badge of
party distinction a cockade of red and blue on a white base, the
colors of revolutionary France. The red and blue cockade thereafter
became the distinguishing mark of the majority of the Pennsylvania
militia, being adopted on the recommendation of no less a person
than Governor McKean. General Fowler’s advocacy of the red and
blue cockade and his disparagement of the black cockade were
incessant. He was an ardent Republican, and his effusions with their
classic allusions filled many columns of the Tree of Liberty and the
Pittsburgh Gazette. At a meeting of the Allegheny County militia held
at Marie’s tavern, the red and blue cockade had been adopted.
Fowler claimed that this was the result of public sentiment. He was
fond of platitudes. “The voice of the people is the voice of God,” he
quoted, crediting the proverb to an “English commentator,” and
adding: “Says a celebrated historian, ‘individuals may err, but the
110
voice of the people is infallible.’” A strong minority in Allegheny
County remained steadfast to the Federal party, and the vote in favor
of the adoption of the red and blue cockade was not unanimous. Two
of the regiments, not to be engulfed in the growing wave of
Republicanism, or overawed by the domineering disposition of
General Fowler, opposed the adoption of the red and blue cockade,
111
and chose the black cockade.
The equipment furnished to the militia by the State was meagre,
but the patriotism which had so lately won the country’s
independence was still at flood tide, and each regiment was supplied
with two silk standards. One was the national flag, the other the
regimental colors. The national emblem differed somewhat from the
regulation United States flag. The word “Pennsylvania” appeared on
the union, with the number of the regiment, the whole being
encircled by thirteen white stars. The fly of the regimental colors was
dark blue; on this was painted an eagle with extended wings
supporting the arms of the State. The union was similar to that of the
national flag. The prescribed uniform which many of the men,
however, did not possess, was a blue coat faced with red, with a
lining of white or red. In Allegheny County a round hat with the
112
cockade and buck’s tail, was worn. The parade ground of the
militia was the level part of Grant’s Hill which adjoined Marie’s tavern
on the northeast. Here twice each year, in April and October, the
militia received its training. Of no minor interest, was the social life
enjoyed by officers and men alike, during the annual assemblages.
In the territory contiguous to Pittsburgh the uprising, for the right
to manufacture whisky without paying the excise, had its inception.
That taverns should abound in the town was a natural consequence.
In 1808 the public could be accommodated at twenty-four different
113
taverns. The annual license fee for taverns, including the clerk’s
charges, was barely twenty dollars. Through some mental
legerdemain of the lawmakers it had been enacted that if more than
a quart was sold no license was required. Liquors, and particularly
whisky, were sold in nearly every mercantile establishment. Also
beer had been brewed in Pittsburgh since an early day, at the “Point
114
Brewery,” which was purchased in 1795 by Smith and Shiras.
Beer was likewise brewed in a small way by James Yeaman, two or
115
three years later. In February, 1803, O’Hara and Coppinger, who
had acquired the “Point Brewery,” began brewing beer on a larger
116
scale.
In the taverns men met to consummate their business, and to
discuss their political and social affairs. Lodge No. 45 of Ancient York
Masons met in the taverns for many years, as did the Mechanical
Society. Even the Board of Trustees of the Academy held their
117
meetings there. Religion itself, looked with a friendly eye on the
taverns. In the autumn of 1785, the Rev. Wilson Lee, a Methodist
missionary, appeared in Pittsburgh, and preached in John Ormsby’s
118 119
tavern, on Water Street, at his ferry landing, at what is now the
northeast corner of that street and Ferry Street. This was the same
double log house which, while conducted by Samuel Semple, was in
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1770 patronized by Colonel George Washington.
Tavern keeping and liquor selling were of such respectability that
many of the most esteemed citizens were, or had been tavern-
keepers, or had sold liquors, or distilled whisky, or brewed beer.
Jeremiah Sturgeon was a member of the session of the Presbyterian
121
Church. John Reed, the proprietor of the “Sign of the Waggon,” in
addition to being a leading member of the Jockey Club, and the
122
owner of the race horse “Young Messenger,” was precentor in the
Presbyterian Church, and on Sundays “lined out the hymns” and led
123
the singing. The pew of William Morrow is marked on the diagram
of the ground-plan of the church as printed in its Centennial
124
Volume. The “Sign of the Cross Keys,” the emblem of Sturgeon’s
tavern, was of religious origin and was much favored in England.
Although used by a Presbyterian, it was the arms of the Papal See,
and the emblem of St. Peter and his successors. That the way to
salvation lay through the door of the tavern, would seem to have
been intended to be indicated by the “Sign of the Cross Keys.”
William Eichbaum, a pillar in the German church, after he left the
employ of O’Hara and Craig, conducted a tavern on Front Street,
near Market, at the “Sign of the Indian Queen.” The owners of the
ferries kept taverns in connection with their ferries. Ephraim Jones
conducted a tavern at his ferry landing on the south side of the
Monongahela River; Robert Henderson had a tavern on Water Street
at his ferry landing; Samuel Emmett kept a tavern at his landing on
the south side of the Monongahela River; and James Robinson had
a tavern on the Franklin Road at the northerly terminus of his
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ferry.
Drinking was universal among both men and women. Judge
James Veech declared that whisky “was the indispensable emblem
of hospitality and the accompaniment of labor in every pursuit, the
stimulant in joy and the solace in grief. It was kept on the counter of
every store and in the corner cupboard of every well-to-do family.
The minister partook of it before going to church, and after he came
back. At home and abroad, at marryings and buryings, at house
raisings and log rollings, at harvestings and huskings, it was the
omnipresent beverage of old and young, men and women; and he
was a churl who stinted it. To deny it altogether required more grace
or niggardliness than most men could command, at least for daily
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use.”
A practical joke perpetrated by the Rev. Dr. John McMillan, on
the Rev. Joseph Patterson, another of the early ministers in this
region, illustrates the custom of drinking among the clergy. On their
way to attend a meeting of the Synod, the two men stopped at a
wayside inn and called for whisky, which was set before them. Mr.
Patterson asked a blessing which was rather lengthy. Dr. McMillan
meanwhile drank the whisky, and to Mr. Patterson’s blank look
127
remarked blandly, “You must watch as well as pray!”
Families purchased whisky and laid it away in their cellars for
future consumption, and that it might improve with age. Judge Hugh
Henry Brackenridge declared that the visit of the “Whisky Boys”—as
the Insurgents from Braddocksfield were called—to Pittsburgh cost
128
him “four barrels of old whisky.” The statement caused Henry
Adams, in his life of Albert Gallatin, to volunteer the assertion that it
nowhere appeared “how much whisky the western gentleman
129
usually kept in his house.”
There was no legislation against selling liquors on Sundays. The
only law on the subject was an old one under which persons found
drinking and tippling in ale-houses, taverns, and other public houses
on Sundays, were liable to be fined one shilling and sixpence; and
the keepers of the houses upon conviction were required to pay ten
shillings. The line of demarcation between proper and improper
drinking being faint, the law proved ineffectual to prevent drinking on
Sundays.
Religion had not kept pace with material progress. The people
had been too much engrossed in secular affairs to attend to spiritual
matters. They were withal generous, and practiced the Christian
virtues; and never failed to help their unfortunate neighbors. This
disposition was manifested in various ways. Losses by fire were of
frequent occurrence and were apt to cause distress or ruin to those
affected. In these cases the citizens always furnished relief. An
instance where this was done was in the case of William Thorn.
Thorn was a cabinet-maker on Market Street, and built windmills and
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Dutch fans. When the house which he occupied was burned to
the ground and he lost all his tools and valuable ready-made
furniture, a liberal subscription was made by the citizens, and he was
131
enabled to again commence his business.
But there was little outward observance of religious forms. The
Germans had made some progress in that direction. The little log
building where they worshipped had been succeeded by a brick
church. The only English church was the Presbyterian Meeting
House facing on Virgin Alley, now Oliver Avenue, erected in 1786. It
was the same building of squared timbers in which the congregation
had originally worshipped. From 1789 to 1793, the church had
languished greatly. There was no regular pastor; services were held
at irregular and widely separated intervals. Two of the men who
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served as supplies left the ministry and became lawyers. From
1793 to 1800, the church was all but dead. The house was deserted
and falling into ruin. Only once, so far as there is any record, were
Presbyterian services held in the building during this period. It was in
1799 that the Rev. Francis Herron, passing through Pittsburgh, was
induced to deliver a sermon to a congregation consisting of fifteen or
eighteen persons “much to the annoyance of the swallows,” as
Herron ingenuously related, which had taken possession of the
133
premises.
A light had flashed momentarily in the darkness when John
Wrenshall, the father of Methodism in Pittsburgh, settled in the town.
Wrenshall was an Englishman who came to Pittsburgh in 1796 and
established a mercantile business. He was converted to
Wesleyanism in England and had been a local preacher there. As
there was no minister or preaching of any kind in Pittsburgh, he
commenced holding services in the Presbyterian Meeting House. His
audiences increased, but after a few Sundays of active effort, a
padlock was placed on the door of the church, and he was notified
that the house was no longer at his disposal. The Presbyterians
might not hold services themselves, but they would not permit the
use of their building to adherents of the new sect of Methodists, “the
offspring of the devil.”
A great religious revival swept over the Western country in the
concluding years of the eighteenth century. In Kentucky it developed
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into hysteria, and in Western Pennsylvania the display of religious
135
fervor was scarcely less intense. The effect was felt in Pittsburgh.

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